


I Need a Break (I'd rather have a breakthrough)

by karrenia_rune



Category: The Goonies (1985)
Genre: Blind Date, Community: smallfandomfest, F/M, Future Fic, Original Character(s), Prompt Fill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-29
Updated: 2015-06-29
Packaged: 2018-04-06 17:32:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4230696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karrenia_rune/pseuds/karrenia_rune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mouth and Stef are reunited years later, in  a rather roundabout manner.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Need a Break (I'd rather have a breakthrough)

Disclaimer: The Goonies and the characters who appear here or are mentioned belong to Warner Bros. and their respective producers and directors. They are not mine. Written for Round 17 of the Live Journal  
based Small Fandoms Fest. Prompt: Years later Mouth and Stef meet again. The title comes from the Rocket Summer song.

"I Need a Break, but I'd Rather have a Breakthrough" by Karrenia

It the middle of the early morning work commute and it had already been a bummer of a day; for starters, he'd woken up later than he had planned mainly because his antiquated alarm clock had failed to go off; part of the problem might have been a dent in the side from when he'd slapped his hand down on it last week in order to get a few more minutes of shut-eye. 

The small rectangular device no longer held its original shape but it still worked, more or less. 

 

Once up, Clarke, once known as Mouth for his sarcastic cutting dry wit and ability to talk himself out of just about any scrap, as a kid; got up, got dressed, and cut himself shaving. It was a tiny nick, just a tiny one and he took a sheet of Kleenex and dabbed at the tiny trickle of blood on his chin. "Off to a great start, aren't we?" he thought to himself wryly. 

At breakfast, a toast and a cup of coffee, black, and a couple Pop-Tarts stuffed into a plastic baggie for the commute, he was on his way to work. For some reason, the old song by the Rembrandts got stuck in his head and he found himself humming all unawares under his breath.

Once he got to work his boss a second-generation Greek by descent, by the name of Manos, and life-long fan of the Brooklyn Dodgers when they were still playing on the East Coast, where Manos believed the team belonged and the club had no business moving out to LA; saw fit to give him a rather watered-down feature of the 'lecture' about being late. Clarke had felt that such a talk was coming, and figured he'd brazen it through. 

After all, what was the worst that the man could do to him? Give him demerits? Dock his pay? Yeah, that would be bad, but working out on the main lot of a used car dealership that was where the real action was, and his salary worked mainly on commission. And if anybody had the talent, the wherewithal and the ability to think fast, talk fast, and act fast, it was Mouth, ah Clark, he meant. 

Sometimes he had a habit of slipping into the old nickname. The way he figured it was just that kind of nickname that one just never quite managed to grow out of it. Also, even though the tiniest signs that had begun his day never quite manifested to become the kind of day that one wished that one had never gotten out of bed that day.

He'd managed to move several cars and was in the process of waiting for a customer to call back to let him know whether or not they wanted to lease a Toyota Camry when went back inside the main building and sat down in the break room for lunch. His friend, Angel Mendoza sat down beside him. Angel was a good guy and he could be counted on a pinch. Although he did have one minor defect, the man was relentlessly cheerful and a genuine people-person.

Clark considered himself a realist; Angel was an optimist; they were opposites in many ways. Maybe that's why the got along so well.

"Why so glum, chum?" asked Mendoza.

"That obvious?" Clark replied, lightly stirring the contents of his microwaveable Chicken Noodle Soup with rice.

"Yeah, and I realize too what your problem is."

"What's that?"

"You need to get out more. You need to see more of the world besides just your apartment and this dealership."

"So, for the sake of argument, let's say that you're right," Clark replied, looking up at the other man. "How do you propose to go about solving the problem? This ought to be good."

 

Angel smiled and brushed a lock of black hair away from his face. "As a matter of fact, I do. I've given this a lot of thought and I've taken the liberty of setting you up on a blind date."

Clark nearly stabbed a noodle with his plastic fork. "What!"

Angel remained calm,"You heard me. And stop acting all indignant, this is me we're talking about, and give me a little credit, Clark, I can, more or less, see through your B.S at least half the time."

"Oh, you can, can you? What's her name?"

"You're going to go?" Angel asked.

"Yeah," Clark replied. "I think I will, one because it will get you to shut up about it; two, I'm curious about how these things work and three, Well, I don't have a third one but I'll think of one soon enough."

"You'll meet her tonight at the Vecchio's on 42nd Ave and Lexington. Do try and look nice. It's casual, but that does not mean that you can show up wearing jeans. You don't have to wear a suit, though. Her name's Stephanie Steinbrenner."

 

"Okay, okay, Geez, what are you, my keeper?" Clark groused.

Angel's face fell, but he mustered up a small smile. "Who else would want the job?"

***

For once he decided to take a cab rather than the subway, and managed to reach the restaurant on time and told the hostess that he was there to met his blind date. Asking for her by her last name. 

He was seated right away and escorted to a booth. He waited awhile and had ordered a non-acholic daquiri to while away the time while he waited for his date to show up. Clark refused to glance down at his face, wondering if she would actually show up, and if she did, what she would look like" brunette. Mousy or a stunner? Since he was inclined to not hope for the best, he figured that anyone Angel found for him would be a retiring librarian type.

Just as these thoughts were going through his head he heard his last name called and a tall, blonde woman came to his table. She had blue eyes and wore her hair down and tumbling about her shoulders, and glasses with wire rims with a silver filigree.

She sat down at his table and reached out a hand, "Hey there, My name's Stephanie Steinbrenner."

Clark shook her hand and said, "Clark Devereaux."

"So, what brings you to the Big Apple?" she asked.

"I, I'm in the automobile industry. You?"

 

"It's hard to describe really, My home base is here in New York, but we travel all over the country. It's exciting work and it means a lot to the children and adolescent athletes that we work for to be able to provide them with the resources that they need."

"Sounds like fun," he replied. "What organization is it?"

"The Special Olympics," she replied. "But listen to me go on," she said pushing up the bottom of her glasses and sighing. "Tell me about you."

 

Just then a waiter came to take their order and they took time to study the menu.

They were had started in on the bread-sticks and then the Works deep-dish New York style pizza when it hit Clark that for some reason that he could not explain the woman sitting across from and laughing at his dry jokes, was not as a complete stranger as he had thought.

In fact, there was something vaguely familiar about the shape of her face, older now, and with a serious aspect that it had not held before. When she smiled it lit up her face, as corny as that sounds, he thought to himself. He had known someone who among so many other pretty and popular girls he had known back home in Oregon had tended to become overlooked, or fade into the background. There had been one girl in particular who had recognized that and had chosen to forge on ahead, had a style all her own. And until the one last great adventure of the summer when all of their friends and families had nearly lost everything to a skitzy, rich land development; a girl he had come to both like and admire.

Somehow between then and now, he had never really given much thought to what might have been? What might have happened if he had asked her out, gone to senior prom, and then maybe give it go? 'Steph, that was it? Nah, it couldn't be. Could it?'

Stephanie had also been intently studying his face and then took off her glasses and gasped as if she could read his mind. "I don't effing believe it! Is it really you? Mouth, can't shut up to save his own life, Mouth?"

"Steph?" 

"Yeah, it's me. What were the odds that we'd met again after leaving home? I can't believe it. I always wanted to look you up,; find out what you were doing? How have you been?

"Good, I've been good."

"Come on, you've got to give me better than good." Steph replied and so saying she reached over grabbed him by the bottom of his paisley green blue tie and kissed him, and kissed him until she had to let go, in order come up for air.

"I've missed you," she sighed, brushing a lock of hair away from her eyes. Even then, I think you were the only one who really got me; you know?"

"I know," he replied. "What say we finish eating and head back to my place?"

"My place, instead, it's a hotel, and we've got a big screen T.V," Steph replied.

"I say, you've got yourself a deal."


End file.
